Turkish pizza business to open second site in London

A London-based Turkish pizza restaurant is to launch a second site in the capital next month.

Pide Oven’s new 50-seat eatery will open in Hammersmith in July, serving Turkish and Cypriot dishes.

Menu items include pide – canoe-shaped flatbreads filled with meat, vegetables and cheese – and lahmacun, a thin-crust flatbread made with unleavened dough and topped with minced meat and vegetables.

Ersen Salih, who opened the first Pide Oven in Charlotte Street in London’s Tottenham Court Road area in 2016, developed the pide and lahmacun ‘salon’-style concept because he said the food was traditionally only eaten as a takeaway option in Turkey.

“I’m Turkish Cypriot and, even with friends and family, we’ve never left our homes or holiday villas to go out and eat this dish,” Salih told British Baker. “It’s always been something we’ll pop out to get and bring back in. For years, everyone has known about doner kebabs but it’s such a small portion of what Turkish food is.”

He added that the dough used in the bases was not fermented like the majority of those used in traditional Italian pizzas.

“The lahmacun flatbread is a very thin flatbread made with water, salt and flour that dates back to the 1400s. You can almost see through it. We make it fresh every two hours to keep it thin and maintain the crispy edges.”

Prices start from £3.90 for one lahmacun flatbread and £7.90 for a serving of pide.

Pizza-style flatbreads are gaining traction in the UK. British Baker subscribers can find out more by reading the latest flatbreads feature here.